Help Cure Plant Blindness through Citizen Science! Participate in TreeVersity at the Arnold Arboretum

The Arboretum’s Living Collection contains over 15,000 plants representing some 4,000 kinds of trees, shrubs, and vines, including the Franklin Tree (Franklinia alatamaha), extinct in the wild for over 200 years. (Photo by Danny Schissler, ©2017 President and Fellows of Harvard College) By Jon Hetman (Associate Director of External Relations and Communications) and Danny Schissler (Research Assistant, Friedman Lab) Boston, MA- If a picture is worth a thousand words, then the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University is sharing more details than ever before about its 15,000 collected plants. The best part—you can help make it happen! In October, the Arboretum launched TreeVersity, a citizen science project designed to collect information on some 25,000 images of the trees, shrubs, and vines growing across its Olmsted-designed landscape. Since its founding in 1872, Arboretum staff have used photography to help document the plants the institution collects, grows, and preserves for scientific study and horticultural display. Thousands of historical images—captured by famed explorers like Ernest Henry Wilson, Joseph Rock, and Frank Meyer—have long been available for viewing and downloading through the online Image Archive of the Harvard University Libraries. Recently, the Arboretum made thousands of contemporary images of its plants—from Abelia chinensis (Chinese abelia) to Zenobia pulverulenta (honeycup)—available on its own website. This extensive Plant Image Database serves everyone from botanists to armchair plant explorers as a free online tool to aid plant identification, connect plant images and plant information, and promote the study and appreciation of biodiversity.